Reader Question- Foxhole Faith

How do you respond to someone who only believes in God when they need someone to blame for their problems?   -Katie

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Hey there, Katie, and thanks for the question. I know what you're talking about, people for whom God is essentially a non-entity until things go wrong. But when they do...

There are several ways to go from here, and I refer to all of them as "foxhole faiths," from the old saw that there are no atheists in a foxhole*. Some people get really religious really fast, using the fanciest language they have at their disposal to make grandiose promises to whatever deity might be willing to listen in exchange for getting out of their jam.

(Those prayers often amuse me in the sense that, once whoever it is gets delivered, I often imagine the one who prayed trying to go back over the list of deities they made promises to and then trying to figure out who came through so they know what is now expected of them. I imagine it would be like an interview process, with a waiting room and everything. I want someone to make a cartoon of this for a t-shirt.)

Others go the other way, blaming God for putting them in this jam in the first place, cursing the divine for creating a world where such situations could exist. I have actually heard someone use the phrase; "You see? THIS is why I didn't believe in you!" which is a very, very interesting statement, theologically.

Finally, there is the middle road. It isn't euphoric, angry, or bombastic, but quiet, considered, a soft plea. Think Everett's prayer when he's about to hang in Oh Brother, Where art Thou? and you'll get the idea. This person wants to retain their dignity, but on the off chance there is something listening, well, why not?

For people who believe more regularly this sort of thing can be very frustrating. In my time as a chaplain in a Children's Hospital, I often heard parents making the grandiose promises in return for their child's life. If their child stabilized, they often looked very awkward when they saw me next, like I was going to deliver the spiritual bill for services rendered... but that really isn't how it works.

I have always said that one of the great things about believing in God is you always have someone to yell at. Even better, if you believe in an all-powerful God, like I do, then you also believe your God can take it, so yell away, God will still be there afterwards, still ready to listen. In really hard times, it is a great thing to have (yes, even if it is just a crutch) and I would never think of denying that to anyone.

Because when you believe as I do, you also believe that God loves people, and cares for them, whether they believe in God or not. Imagine a parent who almost never hears from their adult child, save when things are wrong. Sometimes the child makes grandiose promises of how things will be better, sometimes they come back raging, sometimes they make quiet apologies and requests for assistance.

A lot of their friends would probably tell them to just cut that child off, that they're just being used. But most of the parents I know just shrug it off, knowing that they will be their when their child needs them again, and hoping that, maybe this time, the child will actually keep talking after the crisis has passed.

So how do I respond to them? I pray with them, and for them. I don't try to deliver the spiritual bill. I just hope that, once this wave of crisis has passed, that maybe the conversation, this time, could continue.

*I would like to take this moment to point out that I have not done the research on whether or not there are any atheists on foxholes, not having yet been in a position to properly survey foxhole spirituality.